upon the part of the school to strengthen them. The same
principle is being applied to education in hygiene. Why should not the
church and Sunday school adopt similar methods and undertake a definite
system of encouraging the home to give moral and religious education in
an adequate fashion, rather than attempt to give homeopathic doses to
children _en masse_? Why should not the church, or the school, or both,
give parents instruction and inspiration as to how to educate their
children in matters of sex, about which they are in the best position to
gain their confidence? Should not our clubs and social organizations,
for men and women, boys and girls, face the question, as to whether
their aggregate activities are unduly competing with the home, and
should they not give definite thought as to how they may assist and
strengthen the basic institution of our social organization? If the home
is the essential primary social institution, then its well-being should
command the consideration of every institution of the community; for the
function and objectives of the home cannot be determined solely by
either its own ideals and purposes, or by the values established by the
various special interest groups. The home and the community institutions
are constantly in a process of adapting themselves to each other, and to
the extent that each recognizes the function of the other and is willing
to cooperate rather than to compete, is the highest success of each made
possible.

This problem of the relation of the home to the community is a
relatively new one, and is largely the result of better means of
communication which have enlarged the horizon of every farm home. When
the life of the child was almost wholly within the home and the
neighborhood, the parents gave themselves little concern about the
influence or conditions of the larger community. But when her children
go to a consolidated school and their school associates are unknown to
her, when they attend the movies in the village, and when they read the
local weekly or the city daily newspaper and the monthly magazines, so
that they know what is going on throughout the world, then, if she be
wise, a mother commences to realize that the community is having a
growing influence in shaping their character and that however ideal the
home may be, it is but a part of their lives. She commences to
appreciate that she must have an understanding of the life and forces of
the community